”Our accrued expertise over the period of time helps
us to be effective in the evolving industrial demands”
Satish

Satish
Varma,, Managing Director, Fermenta
Biotech Limited

“Green manufacturing approaches in
pharmaceuticals assumes prime importance
due to its sheer size as well as the overall
alleviation effect it potentially brings to
already stressed environmentally nonbenign
chemical process”, says Satish
Varma, Managing Director, Fermenta
Biotech Limited. In an interview with
Mahesh Kallayil, he further discusses
Indian Biopharma market, Fermenta’s
journey so far, future plans and many more.
Excerpts from the interview.

Please tell us about the performance of Fermenta
Biotech during the past few years highlighting the
latest achievement, strengths and capabilities of
the company?
Across all the verticals of Fermenta, we have poised
a significant growth, which was made possible by
our enhanced productivity, quality and economics
combined with our strategic commitment towards
customer centricity.

Our Vitamin D business vertical which continues to
be our strength area has shown positive growth due
to the various global marketing and sales initiatives
taken by us. The domestic market continues to grow
as the sales and marketing efforts of our company is
augmented with increase in awareness about Vitamin
D deficiency and its consequences.

In our enzyme catalyst business, we reported a stable
business amidst a tough competition from imported
technologies. Notwithstanding, we believe that there
is a growing scope for enzyme catalyst as customers
the world over seek to replace conventional chemical
processes with bio-enzymatic equivalents that deliver
a more environment-friendly, more efficient and more
cost-effective solution marked by higher product purity.
With more companies shifting towards a "green' make
over towards enzyme enabled manufacturing, we
commit to stay focused on what we do.

Our environmental solutions division, the latest
offering of ours has seen a positive growth trend. Key
stakeholders have now recognized the need for robust
biotech solutions for glaring environmental issues in the
field of Solid and liquid waste management systems,
pond and lake bio-remediation. The organization is
committed to offer a plethora of solutions for complex
environmental issues and is all set in introducing a
range of novel product line in the current year.

What sets Fermenta apart from other Biotech
companies with similar offerings?
Fermenta has been a pioneer in immobilized enzyme
technology for the past three decades. It has always
provided an integrated approach, spanning from
enzyme discovery, development and delivery as an
immobilized enzyme technology platform.

This unique spectrum of skill sets is what makes us
special. Our accrued expertise over the period of time helps us to be effective in the evolving
industrial demands and challenges. It also
enables us to provide customized solutions
on any particular immobilization challenge.

A successful enzyme technology platform
means a successful, scalable and
customizable solution and that is our core
strength which makes us stand apart.

May we have your thoughts on green
manufacturing in Pharma?
Across various geographies a paradigm
shift in manufacturing mind-set, defined
figuratively as "Green manufacturing" has
emerged as a trend in developed economies.
Green manufacturing generically re-defines
the existing production system by adhering
to various smarter, benign and eco-efficient strategies.

Green manufacturing approaches in
pharmaceuticals as sumesprime
importance due to its sheer size as well as
the overall alleviation effect it potentially
brings to already stressed environmentally
non-benign chemical process. Apart from
reducing the pollution footprint and being
cost effective, green approaches leads
to cleaner and safer manufacturing shop
floors and more pure final products with
significantly low impurity carry over,
thus reducing the both occupational and
consumption health risk perspectives.

From Fermenta's perspective, we have
been one of the key players in bringing
this large scale transformation into reality
and continue to effectively catalyze
this transition.

Over the past several years, what
are some of the changes that you've
noticed in enzyme development,
and how has Fermenta responded to
these changes?
For the past five years, there has
been a wealth of research on enzyme
development, from various perspectives.
Ranging from developing an enzyme with
a new attribute to inventing a new target
enzyme and providing extra attribute
to a known enzyme's performance this
field has seen it all. Since the enzymatic
processes has already reached a "at
par acceptance status" in replacing the
traditional chemistry, the next expectation
from an enzyme is to stay cost effective
on day to day basis. This indeed was a
dynamic, challenging and shifting goal post
for enzyme research.

With several strategic decisions taken
on enzyme development and creating
effective and rigorous experimental design, Fermenta could positively respond
to these changes and hence continue to
maintain its pioneering and leadership
status in this space.

Central government has identified
Biotec has one among the 25 key
industries to be covered in Make in
India initiative. As a leading biotech
company, how you perceive this and
going to reap the benefit ?
The Make in India initiative has energized
various sectors and biotech is not an
exception, particularly at a time India is
perceived to be the next global biotech
hub. India already has many of the
necessary ingredients such as talented
and enthusiastic scientific workforce and
basic infrastructure needed in order to
grow its bio-economy.

A systematic nurturing and support
from the Government in scaling up the
opportunities across various realms of
biotechnology including environmental
biotechnology would work wonders for
us. As a biotech company, Fermenta
is keen to get associated with the
Make in India initiative and be a part
of transforming our nation into a global
manufacturing destination in the field
of biotechnology.

Are there specific policies, regulatory
or other issues currently in place
that hinder research& development
biotech? What action would you like the
government to take to further improve
the Biopharma arena in India?
Yes, It is indeed promising to see that
the regulatory framework is getting
more stringent and at the same time the
compliance level from industry is also
increasing. Though for general API's as
well as biopharmaceuticals, the regulatory
pathway is well defined and controlled,
the new age enzyme enabled "green"
manufacturing practices is still evolving and
hence there may be some teething issues
at the time of developing specific regulatory
guidelines for this niche. For instance,
concerns on biosafety from the protein /
enzyme carry over on the final API were a
point of concern, especially when there are
no established pharmacopeia standards.

This situation is changing with concerted
efforts being made by various agencies
and industry groups and hence we are
building these regulatory parameters in our
research program.

How do you go about getting funding
for R&D?
Our R&D funding is from internal accruals
only and our commitment to R&D is
quite significant.